www.iFourWinns.com

So its a nice sunny Sunday and the wife and I take our 18 month old out on the boat yesterday for a cruise. No wind at all and zero chop. The baby falls asleep within 5 minutes of being out there and I pick a course pointed south that keeps her in the shade of the bimini as I idle out onto the lake. She sleeps for an hour and I guess we made about 6 miles at this point but we are only maybe 2 miles from shore. As the baby wakes up my wife is looking after her and I shut off the motor to float around while we have lunch. I look out and notice a huge freighter coming out of Hamilton Harbour off in the distance, over a mile away for sure, maybe 2. I don't think much of it other than "damn that is a big vessel for Lake Ontario" and go back to pulling some lunch out of the cooler for the baby.

About 20 minutes later I look up from helping feed our daughter and headed straight at the bow of the boat... IS THE BIGGEST FREAKING WAVE I HAVE EVER SEEN!!! I am not kidding around here and I have been boating for almost 40 years. I don't know how to measure it but I have to guess that from trough to crest this wave is 10'. The motor was off as we were just floating along and THANK GOD we were pointed right at it. I had no time to do anything but grab my daughter and yell at my wife to get down in the bottom of the boat. We hit the initial wave, dropped into the trough and then I swear it felt like the bow was pointed straight up for a minute before we rode down the other side. Amazingly no water came into the boat, probably because the crests were far enough apart to let the boat react.

The baby was crying, probably from my reaction and I have to tell you it was a very scary moment. I don't want to guess what would have happened if we were sideways to this monster. Our daughter did have her life jacket on but my wife and I never wear them. There were a ton of boats out on the lake and behind us by a mile or so were two large sailboats that I saw hit this wake a few minutes later and both plunged their bows deep into the second wave. I'm sure anything not secured below would have been tossed around. I thought maybe I should broadcast a warning on my VHF but I haven't really learned how to use it yet and have no idea about the protocol of doing such, what channel, etc.

SERIOUS lesson learned about big lake boating. This freighter was leaving Hamilton Harbour with what I now can guess was a full load of steel and must have been very very heavy. Who would have thought the wake would be that large and travel that far and still be so substantial. Anyway, you can believe I will be so observant in future and really feel lucky to have avoided a possible deadly accident.

I think this will be my last season on the lake with a 21' boat. I do love having the marina so close to home and everytime we get out on the water I say how much I love being out there. I think a 260 is in my future or a Vista.

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2008 H210SS Yellow VP 5.7 GXi 320 HP (sold May 2010)
2008 Mercedes ML 320 CDI Diesel

Sounds like Divine intervention to me. You are absolutely right about respecting the big lakes. I'm sure I speak for all when I say we are glad you were able to write this post as opposed to us reading about it in the papers.

Scary story, glad all turned out ok. The positive spin here is this will probably be all the encouragement your admiral needs to fully support a bigger boat.

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-Tom
2003 298 Vista

WOW thank goodness everything turned out alright!!

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Troy
2008 Centurion Avalanche
1994 Four Winns Horizon 180 SE 5.0L OMC Cobra (Sold)
2002 Ford F150 Harley Davidson Edition (http://www.nhtoc.com) 378 hp & 465 tq at rear wheels
2008 Honda Accord EX-L w/Nav

I sometimes venture into Long Island Sound and at times there are freighters and tugs towing big barges that come through....ususally we will go to a spot known as The Triangle which is formed by 3 bouys off the shore of Eaton's Neck NY. One of them is half way between NY and Conn so it's a pretty large area... And I have never felt comfortable just drifting with the engine off...because those wakes can come out of nowhere...even if it's a much smaller boat than you described...the wake depending on speed can be huge...so often I will let the engine idle unless we are in a protected area close to shore...I have had to pop that old Cobra into gear and 'GET OUT OF DODGE' more than once because of big wakes.....glad I didn't have to start the engine first.....

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88 Four Winns 200 Horizon
4.3 OMC Cobra-4bbl
2002 Walker Bay 10/2012 Suzuki 2.5
2008 Walker Bay 8

1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4.0/Selectrac
2007 Jeep Grand Cherokee 5.7 Hemi/Quadradrive II

I am glad you and your family are ok… We boat in St Laurence Seaway and the mouth of Lake Ontario so We have been there few times as well….. Those freighters can push a lot of water and create a huge swell … It can be scary sometimes even on 260 especially when they sneak up on us...

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08 H260 VP 8.1Gi DP.....Previous
2013 Crownline E6 Merc 8.2MAG BIIIX, DTS/SC

Amazing! Glad everyone is OK. We had a similiar experience, albeit much smaller in scale this weekend. We were at the dock at our marina which is in a small cove about a mile in from the Chesapeake Bay main body of water (Thomas Point) and a series of big waves started crashing all around for what appeared to be no reason at all... after reading about your experience I am thinking perhaps they were generated out in the main channel by some of the ocean-liners that we have transiting by to/from Baltimore.

Man, that must have been scary!

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Stacy & Isora in Annapolis, MD
2005 Vista 298

EGAD....Glad everyone was OK. I would have had flashbacks of "deadliest catch" if I saw that.

Then I would have gone and changed my underwear..

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Don't forget the plug....
.......Don't ever forget the plug......

A few years ago, we learned about big boat wakes as well, with our 245 Sundowner ....

We were just out of Portsmouth Harbor and it was kind of sloppy, so we wer just chugging along, trying to decide if we wanted to head down the coast to Newburyport, or call it off due to the required slower speed (beacuse of the sloppy chop).

I saw a large yacht coming into the Newcastle Harbor ... made a point to stay out of the way. As it comes by, it must have been 150'+, I then see the wake coming. Looked moderately large, so I started to get ready to move along. Well. it got to us sooner than expected, just had enough time to get the boat pointed at it (as opposed to sideways or stern-to). Quite frankly, I didn't think it was going to be that big of a deal. WOW ... that thing had to be 8 to 10 feet from crest to trough ... and really tight spaced. Took the next one over the bow...... watched the wall of water wash up over the deck, past the windshield and drench everyone in the cockpit. The ony ones that saw it coming were me & son #3 ... standing next to me.

All was fine .... except for a couple .... ummm ... peeved women.

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Gordon Arnold
New Hampshire

2003 268 Vista ..................................................................Prior: 97 245 Sundowner